The Bloody History of the City of Love

 

The perception of Paris as a city of romance and high fashion may be little more than the result of a sustained and very successful PR campaign. The reality is that, from the Place du Concorde (where the guillotine was raised during the revolution of 1789) to the south-west wall of Pere Lachaise cemetery (against which many of the communards of 1871 were executed by firing squad), the streets of Paris are not just tinged with the rosy red glow of romance, but are also drenched with the blood of countless generations of rebels.
The number of buildings you see dotted around the city that now carry memorial plaques listing every resident arrested and sent to concentration camps during the collaborationist Vichy regime of WW2 is indeed a sobering sight for any visitor to the city. 

Most people alive today will recall the recent ISIS-inspired atrocities carried out at the offices of the satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo and music venues like the one close to the Place du Bastille that shocked the world in 2015.

In 2018 and into 2019 the streets of Paris, especially around the Place de la Republique, as well as many other towns and cities around the country, exploded in popular protest organised by the "gilets jaunes" (yellow vests), essentially fuel protests which saw some extreme instances of police brutality. The streets were drenched in tear gas and some protestors were partially blinded by rubber bullets.

The French are good at preserving their heritage. The Cafe du Croissant, at 146 rue Montmartre in northern Paris, is where the socialist politician and anti-war activist Jean Jaures was assassinated on July 31 1914 by a nationalist. Both the cafe where he was murdered and the newspaper he founded (l'humanite) still exist to this day.

Paris is also the city where one of the leading Moroccan opposition politicians, an anti-colonial activist named Mehdi Ben Barka, was disappeared after speaking to a couple of gendarmes outside Brasserie Lipp (still there) and murdered on 29 October 1965 for his key role in the anti-colonial struggle both in Morocco and the wider Arab world. Details of his murder remain largely classified, and speculation about the involvement of Moroccan, Israeli and US intelligence in his murder is still rife.

Another atrocity of the same period that is rarely discussed in the west, and has only recently been subjected to more rigorous historical analysis, occurred towards the end of the Algerian war of independence. It is an event that will make you look at the waters of the Seine in a whole new light, and may also provide a deeper insight into contemporary Islamophobia in France.

Documentaries about the 17 October 1961 atrocity

17 octobre 1961, un crime d'Etat (dir. Ramdane Rahmouni; 2021)

This is a recent 51 minute documentary (in French with Arabic subtitles) in which historians, activists and witnesses describe the massacre of Algerian protestors that took place in Paris, France. Conservative estimates suggest at least 200 people were thrown from the Pont Saint-Michel into the Seine. For Algerians it is regarded as a “colonial crime”, which was carried out by French police in order to silence Algerian voices during the final stages of the liberation war. It can be viewed here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HquI833DNCk

Octobre à Paris (October in Paris) (dir. Jacques Panijel; France; 1962)

One of the first detailed accounts of the atrocity, the distribution of this film was suppressed by the French authorities until 1973, when it was granted a limited “visa d'exploitation”, and it would have to wait until 2011 to receive a full theatrical release. Other films have been made about this dark and bloody phase of modern French history, including:

Le silence du fleuve (The silence of the river) (dir. Mehdi Lallaoui; 1991), and

Ici on noie les Algeriens (Here we drown the Algerians) (dir. Yasmina Adi; France; 2011).

Books

Jean-Luc Einaudi was a French historian and socialist activist. He remains largely unknown in the English-speaking world (try searching for an English translation of any of his books). Much of his work was devoted to extensively researching the events of 17 October, as well as other crimes and abuses committed by the French authorities in their efforts to put down local support for the Algerian independence struggle. A couple of his books are cited below:

Einaudi, Jean-Luc La bataille de Paris, 17 octobre 1961 (Seuil, 1991)

Einaudi, Jean-Luc Le dossier Younsi. 1962 : procès secret d'un chef FLN en France (Tirésias, 2013)

This article is a draft. Let me know in the comments below how much of the history mentioned above you were aware of. Personally, I only became aware of the events of October 1961 from Arab commentators and Arabic (specifically Algerian) media, so I would be very interested to hear other peoples' experiences.

A little bit of Arabia in the heart of Paris

Pictures taken at the Grand Mosque in Paris, France last September 2019.

I haven't been to Morocco since 1994, but for a brief moment in time it almost feels like I have left the streets of southern Paris behind and I am deep in the Casbah of Tangier.

According to Mrs McPherson, during WW2 this majestic building was used as a makeshift school for Jewish children, whose families were being sheltered from the Vichy government of Nazi collaborators by Algerian partisans involved in the French Resistance.

As a counter-balance to the intense history associated with the Grand Mosque is the cafe which occupies one corner of the site, where beautiful mint tea again transports me back to a Tangier of the mind.

I simply cannot do justice, at present, to the beautiful intricacy of Islamic design, so I am letting the photographs speak for themselves.

Bandes-dessinees: the Rich World of French Comics

I have always been aware of the respect that the French hold for the arts. More to the point, since learning, in the mid-1990s, that the two most famous names of 1960s U.S. underground comix - Robert Crumb and Gilbert Shelton - had both chosen independently to emigrate to France, I have also been conscious that this high regard also extends to that form of graphic storytelling and social commentary so frequently dismissed in the English speaking world as "comics" or "cartoons" (I imagine this is because no one has yet coined a more succinct term, meaning the endless confusion with fields like animation and stand-up comedy persist).
Growing up in the UK I found that only a thin slice of French talent was ever translated and published in English. I had heard of the work of the science fiction illustrator Moebius (pen name of the late Jean Girard), for instance, or the humorous slice-of-life cartoons of Claire Bretecher, and of course books like Asterix and Iznogoud figured prominently in my reading habits from a young age (certainly as much as MAD magazine), but that was about it. 
As i grew up and found myself wanting to seek out newer or more different work I soon found that unless you read Heavy Metal magazine avidly (this being the US version of France's sci-fi/fantasy magazine Metal Hurlant, nothing to do with the music genre), there were very few opportunities to find work by French artists short of actually learning some French and going there.
One of the interesting things you find when you do go there is how mainstream the French love of comics and satirical magazines is. It extends well beyond the walls of comic shops, as here you will find that they grace the shelves of most newsagents in the country. It reminds me of that brief renaissance in the late 80s-early 90s when British newsagents's shelves were filled with VIZ imitators.

The reality for UK mass market comics aimed at a more mature audience has consisted for many years now primarily of VIZ and Private Eye (both of which are really humorous or satirical magazines that also happen to publish a lot of comic strips or gag cartoons). This figure at least doubles as soon as you cross the Channel. For every VIZ you have a Fluide Glacial and (periodically) l'Echo des Savanes. For every Private Eye you have papers printed on equally cheap looking newsprint with names like Le Canard enchaine, Sine Mensuel or Charlie Hebdo.
It also impressed me that within just one French comic magazine you find a much wider diversity of drawing styles than I am used to seeing in either VIZ or more kid friendly fare from DC/Thompson. (This is one area in which the long-running science fiction mag 2000ad bucks the trend at least.) 
Perhaps it is just because I grew up with MAD and US underground comics more than Marvel and DC that I feel more invigorated by publishers that do not cultivate a "house style"? 
In just one edition of Fluide Glacial, for instance, I have seen artists as diverse as those with the loose cartoon-style of Fabrice Erre or Edika, to those with the detailed realism of Dominique Bertail.
And that's just on the news-stands. There is of course an equally dedicated array of specialist comic shops catering for people that enjoy longer, graphic novels. Rue Dante, in the area known as the Latin Quarter (on the south side of the River Seine), has long maintained a collection of different comics and speciality stores. Over the years, we have even seen this unique market developed and catered to by a science fiction-themes creperie.  
Almost makes me wish I could speak French more fluently!